How to easily make 2500+ blog posts that are extremely valuable

We know that in 2017-2018 it will no longer suffice to just write super short snippet posts. Yes, we want to build amazing cornerstone content that will totally drive heaps of traffic. Are you one of those bloggers that like writing, but writing that really long blog post seems impossible, ‘cause I was.  So you have no clue on how to write a 2500+ word long blog post on just one topic?

Do you want to write amazing insightful posts full of information for your amazing readers? Do you want to write them effortlessly and make them amazing? Are you afraid long posts will be skipped because they are too boring to read? Not when you follow this plan!

(This whole post is based on the fact that I needed to write and research essay. I realized halfway through that many of the tactics that help you write an amazing essay, also apply to writing a great blog post.)

But first, why should you even write these long posts? (seems like a lot of work if you don’t know why you are doing it)

• Rank higher in search engines because of SEO
• Provide an immense amount of value for your reader by having long and in-depth posts.
• You are standing out. There are still many bloggers who only write posts that are 500 words long. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with short posts and if they are well written they can attract loads of traffic, writing some long posts shows your readers you are putting in the hard work!
• They are easy to re-purpose into another kind of content. They are so packed with info that they can be rewritten tweets, emails and more. Also if you write 4x 2500+ word articles on the same topic and you combine all that, it is a well-sized ebook.

This post by Neil Patel shows the entire data-driven answer (A great example of a 3000+ post btw!)

Don’ts of writing long posts

Don’t

• Writing something into a long 2500+ post that could have been explained in a much shorter format. This doesn’t add any value to your readers and only gives you a lot more work.
• Fill up posts with non-relevant information. Don’t feel like you need to add sentences that repeat previously said things or add non-relevant side notes just to reach a certain word count. Again, this adds no value at all and just makes your post more cluttered and thus less easy to read.
•  make huge blocks of text. Even Though you are writing a huge amount of text, it must still be easy to scan. Therefore, you will need white space, images, headings and all the other things that make blog posts easier to read.

Firstly blog post ideas;

If you don’t have one already, start a file or something where you can keep all your blog post ideas.

I keep mine on the Google keep app because I can simply access them all the time and I can add all the ideas and notes I already have on the topic on the same note.

Since I have started using this app I already start most blog posts with 200+ words because of the notes I have made on the blog posts ideas. (I can import these into google doc where I write most of my blog posts nowadays, before copy-pasting them to WordPress)

You should have a strong idea of what you want to achieve with your blog post idea; is it going to be a how-to article or a big list. What will be the benefit of this post for your reader?

Also, make sure it is a topic you could actually write a lot about. There are many topics that can simply be spoken about in a short 500-1000 word post. (Those will also be much quicker to write anyway)

So choose the right topic to write your long in-depth article about.

If you have several blog post ideas that are similar, consider combining those into one huge blog post.

Do loads of research

Your first step when planning a long post should always be; research. When you have chosen a topic, let’s say “How to decide the price of your services” there are several kinds of research to do.

But if you already have some ideas and points to make, don’t be afraid to write them all down first, before you start researching (this way you don’t forget them all)

Firstly; SEO keyword research for this topic- so you can implement them while writing

Great post by Nerdly organized on how to do that!

Secondly; Headline research – to create an attention-grabbing headline

Of course, we all know the headline analyzer that will help you do this.

Then for your actual content, you can start with making a research question list, something like this.

• What do other people sell their services for and what do they offer?
• What kind of methods are there to determine the price?
• Are there any apps, social groups or applications that can help
• What are my personal views on this

Research questions are a great way to pull content from a different kind of subject to combine in your new posts. They also give you a good guide to what you need to google.

(By the way, Pinterest is an amazing search engine for blog post research as well! )

You will also need to read some other blogger’s post on the subject. Look out for

• Things you agree or disagree with (Either to reference or to voice your alternative opinion about.)
• Things you hadn’t thought off (Like linked topics, views you hadn’t considered -make sure you give credit for original thoughts!)
• Posts and websites they link to – it might be to some interested to you since you are writing about the same topic = more research opportunity.

You are looking for blog posts on similar topics or something that is related to the topic.

Let’s say we go back to the main question “How to decide the price of your services”, similar posts from other bloggers could be things like “How to pay yourself in a creative business” Or “How to use competitor research to price your own products” Etc.

If any of the research gives you new ideas, points of view or notes to add, add them to your file too. (Don’t think you can do this later, in my experience, you will often forget those points you were going to make.They will be lost forever, if you don’t write them down before you start reading even more on the topic.)

Side note; reading other bloggers content for research is great, but you should never ever copy other bloggers’ work. This is definitely stealing and when people find out (which they definitely will) they will not be happy. This can seriously hurt your blog and brand, so just don’t do that. 

This post by Forever Amber does an amazing job of explaining copyright for bloggers!

Combine all your research

Hopefully, in the last steps you have made lots of notes, saved some links and you now have loads of information ready.

When you are looking at the information, go ahead and add anything that comes to mind. Any extra questions, side notes, posts you have written previously, or any experiences.

This is why I like to do my initial research on paper (with a google doc file for the links). That way I can work with arrows, side notes, highlighting etc.

Read more;  Which is better; writing on paper vs. Computer

After all your research and extra notes, I think you could already have 1000+ words (I had 1045 words at this point!!)

Outlining a post

To make it easier to write a cohesive story it is a good idea to make an outline of your post. I personally do this by adding the subheadings I think I will need. This means the topics I want to cover and in which order.

Sometimes I will also start with writing an introduction. These are not my strongest point but having it gives me a good idea of what the goal of the post will be.

Having a strong outline helps you organise your information into a readable story.

So, when writing your outline;

• Start with subtopics or subquestions that you want to include
• Keep in mind what you want the order of the subjects to be.
• Write a draft of the introduction and as a conclusion, you could include a small recap what you want the article to be.  

In the outline, you will fit all your research by topic. Every heading should contain some of the previously acquired information now. This should definitely look like your post is coming together already.

Side note; Each heading in your outline (and later in the finished blog post) should give a clear overview of what is in those paragraphs. Just like a blog title, poetic headings don’t really help readers understand the text and don’t necessarily encourage further reading.

Write the actual story aspect

Blog posts are seldom lists of random looking facts pasted together with some heading sprinkled in between.  Mostly they consist of cohesive writing and a storytelling style that convey information to the reader.

So instead of just letting it be a mix of weirdly pasted together information, we will now start with some actual writing.

Writing the storyline;

1. Random information pasted together doesn’t really make a readable blog post. When I gather information and notes I mostly do so in short points. I don’t use whole sentences or introduce the subject. Assuming you do largely the same I start with writing out my notes first. I will not necessarily add anything (except any thoughts I get while working out my notes so I don’t forget those, trust me if you don’t write those down you will forget them while working with these large amounts of notes. )
2. Combine paragraphs and notes by using transition words and sentences. Especially focussing on adding loads of connections between different notes and information to form them into an actual story instead of loose pieces.
3. Write introduction and conclusions to all the paragraphs. For every separate heading, there should be a short introduction sentence, and something to conclude the whole paragraph.

A well-written storyline in your blog pulls your reader in. It guides them through all the pieces of information. In the end, it should make it easy for them to understand your main points and not feel lost in the text.

Now that you have done the storyline writing you should have around doubled your text. (So around 2000+ words)

Adding the personality

You now have Information and research that is written into a cohesive piece, which is great. Your readers are coming here and seeing a sea of text on a topic so what is going to keep them reading? Your great writing style and amazing personality, of course.

You might think by now “this post is incredibly long and boring”, but in the last step we are going to change that.

(Plus, this will give us the last 500+ words that will complete the post!)

Firstly, add some personal notes and sayings to add personality. Don’t be afraid to edit sentences to make them sound more like you. You can add some more casual English (I almost never do this, but it sounds totally natural when I read it on other blogs) and exclamations.

References and personal thoughts also make a blog post sound more like you.

Adding personality to your posts make them stand out from posts on the same topics.

Edit your post into perfection

Okay, we all know that perfection is just another way for procrastination, but you get what I mean. We are going proofread and edit. 

Here are the points we are looking out for;

• long paragraphs and sentences need to be split into shorter versions
• add extra clarification to vague statements (like places where you are using “this” or “that” but it could be unclear what you are referring to)
• Add side notes and remarks where you have something personal to add (or if something needs a little more explaining)

A little tip for re-reading a blog post; Always leave a gap in the time between writing and rereading. Allowing for a break between writing and rereading makes it so that you can look at your content with fresh eyes.

This way you can spot mistakes that you hadn’t earlier. Or finally, see the solution to a point you just couldn’t get worded correctly. Stepping away from your work can do loads for you.

This is why I am always working on several different blog posts at a time.

Lastly, make your blog post even more readable by editing the text. Enter and blank lines are your best friend in long posts like these. Also, make sure you use bold and italics. If you have something that could be listed, it makes for a nice break in the text.

Again, you need to split up long paragraphs, so readers don’t get lost in the text. Long sentences that are unnecessary will also make it harder to read a text.

Remember the text needs to be easy to scan and fun to read. So add headings, bullet points and more. If you scroll really fast you should get an idea what the text is about by reading those.  

If you have been following this method you should be around the 3000+ words by now. But there is a catch;

Whatever it is what you are writing, you always need to start with more text and info then you necessarily need. Always write so much that you need to edit down.

After you have included all the info, editing it down makes your content easier to read, look more information dense & more valuable.

Don’t write too little to start with and don’t “fill up” a blog post with unnecessary things. Editing down always results in better blog posts.

Also if you are editing your blog post make sure you are looking out for repetitive use of the same words. (Unless, of course, for SEO purposes.)

Not only does repetitive word use make it harder to read posts, it can even get irritating for your readers.  Look for synonyms or try putting it another way for a better overall reading experience.

Read it out loud. You will immediately hear if you have well-written sentences. It will also be easier to hear any mistakes. It is also a good way to hear if you have a comprehensive story.

The very last step; edit Introduction and Conclusion

Did editing down put you below the golden threshold? Don’t worry there are still two elements to edit! The introduction and the conclusion.

But Sofie, we already wrote them when we were creating the outline! That is the point! By now you should have the entire article written out, and that means that you know exactly what is in this piece of content you have miraculously made from scratch.

So;

1. Now you can write an introduction that makes your reader excited about what is to come!
2. You can write a conclusion that correctly summarizes your points.

An introduction could be 100+ depending on how you are going about it. The conclusion can be slightly longer since you have loads to summarise.

Not sure on how to write an introduction? This post by Glitz Grammar helps!

Sidenote; if you didn’t yet, this is also the moment to include all the links you have gathered earlier and to add links to your own older posts. Make them blend nicely into the text and add some “read more” lists for optimal linking results.

Read more; Spinning your online web; how to catch the right attention

Conclusion

Your guide to writing a super awesome long blog post that people will love to read;

1. Research your topic
2. Organise your notes in an outline
3. Write the actual storyline
4. Add personality
5. Edit your blog post into perfection

And to finish the whole thing off; Make sure your long blog post is scannable, Make sure your post is easy to read & Add loads of personality to keep readers entertained. 

Are you feeling inspired yet to write an amazingly long and in-depth post on your blog? If you do, feel free to leave any posts you have written in the comments below.

Also, I would love it if you want to share this post, to inspire other bloggers into writing longer posts!

Joined in this amazing link party; Bloggers Pit Stop!  Check it out!